Sacramento head coach Doug Christie opted to keep the veteran on the bench late in the shooting loss to Portland. Does this further fuel trade speculation?
Doug Christie placed his trust in this trio to will the Sacramento Kings back from down 18 points: Russell Westbrook, DeMar DeRozan, plus rookie Maxime Raynaud against the Portland Trail Blazers.
Noticeably missing? Guard Malik Monk, who sat on the bench as a coach's decision.
But fans wondered why Christie made such a decision -- and why Monk never earned any minutes.
Christie offered up his explanation via Kings insider for the Sacramento Bee Jason Anderson.
"We were going with defense, but it’s a logjam," Christie said via The Sacramento Bee's Anderson). "We’ve got a lot of guards, so whenever it was Keon [Ellis] being the odd man out, then it was Keon being out. Tonight, we were playing Keon, so Malik was out."
Yes indeed the Kings are guard heavy. Westbrook finished with a double-double -- although he was on the wrong end of a controversial foul call that eventually led to Portland's final baskets.
Meanwhile, Ellis has played sparingly for the Kings this season but earned 32 minutes off the bench. He became one of five Kings players to surpass the 30-minute mark -- joining Westbrook, DeRozan, Raynaud, and Keegan Murray. Ellis earned the most playing time out of all the bench options for Christie -- scoring 10 points in the process.
Does this mean Ellis will earn a consistent amount of minutes moving forward?
"Nothing is permanent," Christie said. "Obviously, we’re going to continue to try to make it happen, but Keon played well. We’ll give Keon a run and allow him to continue to develop with those guys.
"He came in off the bench, I thought, and played fantastic with that bench unit," Christie continued. "They did a really good job in the third quarter. It just kind of got away from us. We got stalled out a little bit, but they came back with the starters and Keon was a part of that group. … I thought those guys did a great job."
Still, the Monk move points to the beginning of the end of his Kings tenure. Monk's name is mentioned among the list of Kings players who could get traded -- a list featuring DeRozan, Zach LaVine, and Domantas Sabonis -- the latter two absent from the Thursday night loss.
However, Christie confirmed to Anderson that Monk's benching had nothing to do with him being attached to trade rumors and remains a part of the guard crew.